Compiled by Erin J. Fellores
The Indian state of Karnataka is
implementing a bus pass system to students, and then the public at large, which
will assist the daily user traffic of 250,000 passengers.
The transportation company in charge of the bus pass system is a
large, service oriented public-sector that owns 6,000 vehicles and carries
250,000 passengers every day.
Prior to the system,
students would identify themselves with their school or college ID card and
would be given concession tickets via a manual ticketing system. The system was
selected in order to increase accountability and speed up the process of
dispensing secured bus passes. A personalized card is given to each student;
when the card is brought within range of the Electronic Ticketing Machine
(ETM), their bus pass is automatically generated.
“This is an important project for Cardz Middle East, and we’re
excited to be tackling something of this scale,” says Nitin Shabbir, managing
director of Cardz Middle East. “We are integrating DigiOn24 Mifare Encoders
with Nisca PR5350 high-speed printers, to provide smooth automation and
printing.” The new bus pass system also uses Mifare 1K cards, and a fully
colored card personalization with encoding takes only 30 seconds to print.
“Our fast,
high-quality printers contribute to the overall efficiency of the Mifare
process, and to the ultimate objective of smooth and speedy transits,” says
Irina Polunina of Team Nisca.
Initially to be introduced only for students, the ID system will
gradually expand to the general public, with a target issuance of half a
million cards per year. Cardz Middle East has developed a custom software
system to print and encode the cards, connecting it with a database. Depending
upon the student’s requirements, passes will be issued on a weekly, monthly or
annual basis.
